Well Shit

So I haven't posted in close to a month, but I swear I have a decent reason. Er... Reasons. Multiple reasons.

At the beginning of the month, I started looking into schools with a pharmacy technician program so that I could learn all I could stuff into my little brain and take the national exam. I found a school that I liked. It was nice, small, with a very small class size and a high graduation and job placement statistic. The only real problem with this was it ended up being too perfect. The classes ran from 8:30am-1pm. I work from 10am-4pm. That doesn't end up working out very well, honestly.

I then took the entrance quizzy thing just for shits and grins because the lady in admissions said it would be nice just in case I could work out my work schedule. I took it, and apparently, I had a high enough score because she jokingly asked if I was sure I didn't want to be in her LPN class instead.

She sent me home with information, and all that jazz for me to look through before I made a decision. Due to a lot of typos in the program catalog she had given me, I ended up on the page for the nursing program instead of the pharmacy technician. I looked it over, discovered it had a night class, and BAM! I'm suddenly looking into nursing instead of pharm tech.

So that was about three weeks ago. I start classes next week. You can see how attempting to prepare for school in three weeks can be a bit time consuming with the financial aid nonsense.

I wish that was all, but at the beginning of this week, my car breaks down. I'm due to start classes next week, I have all of my start up costs in the bank, and my car breaks down. I was so pissed. I brought it into the shop, and called the school to tell them I may have to wait until January because the money I had saved for school is suddenly being thrown into my car instead.

Well, this school is awesome. I was told not to worry about it, they'd find someone who could carpool with me until I get my car fixed, and they can work with me on the start up costs (most of which are for a supplemental anatomy and physiology class). That helped a lot, but between that and not having all of my paperwork completed, I was on the verge of a very large panic attack.

A little background about my car. I got this car last December when my first car developed a case of rust so bad that it couldn't be repaired. I still owe close to four thousand dollars on this thing, so you can see where my panic mode kicked in. I was more worried about suddenly being without a car, but still having loan payments than anything else.

But anyway! Car's fixed, I'm still starting school, and I will hopefully be back to my regular weekly rants next Friday!

Those Little Copay Cards

I really don't like them very much. Purely because a customer will bring it in after their doctor has handed it to them due to lack of insurance, and then we learn that there's a load of super fine print.

Take, for instance, the $4 copay card for Lipitor. Now, Lipitor is fucking expensive. As in, thirty tablets costs you over $100 kind of expensive, so a card that drops the copay to only $4 is practically a godsend for patients whose doctors insist they need Lipitor and not something infinitely less expensive like Simvastatin or any blood pressure medications that fall under the same therapeutic class.

That is, until someone like me attempts to run the damn thing. We then sit there and scratch our heads in confusion at a price of $60 something. That is definitely not $4, so we go to the pamphlet that comes with the card. We read, and read, and read until we finally come across this lovely bit. Let me see if I can't copy/paste this piece from the website.

"To qualify for this offer, your out-of-pocket expense must be greater than $4 per prescription. If your out-of-pocket expenses for a 1-month supply (30 tablets) are $54 or less, you will pay $4 for a 1-month supply. If your out-of-pocket expenses for a 1-month supply (30 tablets) exceed $54, you qualify for up to $50 in savings for a 1-month supply. In either case, you can only qualify for up to $600 of savings per calendar year. After maximum of $600, you will pay usual monthly out-of-pocket costs."

 Note that this isn't written on the card. It says in very large letters "$4 Co-pay Card," but not that your insurance has to pay for a certain amount before they'll drop the copay to $4. It would be nice if customers who are stuck with this were told in advance, but I've noticed a fun trend in doctors just handing out the cards and not going over them with their patients. Despite, you know, how helpful that would be to themselves as well as us because they then have to listen to their customers bitch to them about how expensive the drug they put them on is.

I just feel myself lucky that the man we were working with yesterday was very nice and understanding, if not very (understandably) frustrated.

That Would Make Us Happy, But...

So. It's been about a month since we last saw Miss Switch, and she finally called us up yesterday. I pick up the phone, as I tend to do despite my survival instincts screaming against it, and cringe when she gives me her name. Pharmacy Manager actually looked at me funny because I full-body cringed upon hearing her name.

She wants one of her medications refilled; fine, whatever the fuck will get you out of my eardrums faster. She wants it filled as a ninety day supply instead of thirty because her doctor has decided that it won't kill her; again whatever shuts you up faster. We hang up, I got to poke through her profile a little and face palm.

Her doctor hadn't written the prescription as a ninety day supply. Meaning that even though it still had six refills left on it, we can only fill it for thirty day supplies by law. She came in before we could call her, but Pharmacy Manager, being a much nicer person than myself, called and left a message for her doctor asking that a new script be written for ninety days.

Well she gets there before the doctor called back.

And she threw a butt-hurt bitch-fit to end all.

"What do you mean, I can't fill it for ninety days?! I have six refills on it, don't I?!"

"Yes, ma'am, but because the doctor didn't give us permission to fill for ninety days, we can only dispense in thirty day supplies. That's the law."

"Well if I have six refills left on it, I should be able to get however much I want at one time!!!"

"That's not how that works, ma'am."

"FINE! Call me when the doctor calls back!"

Pharmacy Manager just looks at me and says, "She's a treat, isn't she? I kinda hope we get permission to fill it for ninety days. Not seeing her for three months would be nice."

Well That's Awkward

So one thing they never tell you when you take on a job in the pharmacy: you will see people you know/have known.

It's really not that difficult to imagine, really. People need medications, and that's what you're there to give them with relatively few questions asked if possible. There is, however, going to be a few awkward moments when people you know need to get embarrassing medications. They then know that you know what they're getting.

Take for instance, suppositories. Necessary medications sometimes, but pretty fucking embarrassing when you know the person dispensing them to you personally. I can imagine it would be even more embarrassing if, say... You and your friends were complete and total assholes to the one giving you your prescription ages ago.

Now just take that image, and imagine my absolute glee when I saw the name on the prescription sent to us along side the medication you were receiving. Also imagine my immense amusement as you shift uncomfortably while I ask if you have any questions at all for the pharmacist on your prescription. While you attempt to make smalltalk to diffuse your discomfort, I am trying my damnedest to keep as straight a face as I possibly could, because cackling maniacally is really frowned upon for the most part when dealing with a customer.

Moral of the story? Don't be a dick. When you grow up, the kid you were a dick to is likely going to have access to your most personal of personals. Even if they don't tell anyone because of those foolish things called privacy laws, they'll know, and you'll know they know.

And that will drive you nuts, won't it?

Getting Ready for the Storm

Yeah, okay. So we're getting a very large storm. You would think that all of the winter experience the people in the fabulous state of Maine have with such things during the winter, that they would have at least the essentials stored away already.

Apparently, I'm an idiot for thinking such things. Working in a retail pharmacy that is located in a grocery store, I got to watch people rushing around for things like flashlights and batteries. Really? Don't you already have, I don't know... Five or six fracking flashlights from when you were doing your running around like a chicken fresh from the gallows this past winter?

Getting your medications squared away, I can understand. I will never fault someone for planning for something like that. If you get trapped in your house with only one or two days' supply of whatever meds your on, that would suck. It wasn't the business of the pharmacy this past week that bothered me.

What did bother me was what I saw people buying. These are the same exact things I'll see people buying in bulk when a snow storm hits come December:

• Milk
• Ice cream
• Frozen pizza
• Other various frozen foods/meals

Really? I mean... Really?! In what realm of thought is buying refrigerated or frozen items just before potentially losing your power a smart idea? It isn't even like in winter where it's cold enough to just shove whatever it is outside to keep it cold! This is a tropical fucking storm we have coming toward us, people! Buy your flashlights, buy your water, toilet paper, bread, peanut butter, granola bars, and whatever the fuck else you can that doesn't require refrigeration or cooking! I know for a fact that a lot of you aren't equipped with camping supplies like Coleman stoves, nor do you have fireplaces, so I have no idea how you plan to cook these things.

I just... Can't for one second fathom what could be going through the minds of the people buying some of the most useless items during a time like this. It makes me reevaluate my status on never having children purely so that the overall IQ of the population can stay at a reasonable level.

Because not everything is doom and gloom

Yesterday was actually a relative nice day. I had to skip working on Monday because of a funeral, so coming in to a nice day on Tuesday was fantastic. The sudden death of a coworker and friend last week is what has kept me from really feeling like posting snarky comments to the world.

Back to the subject at hand... Tuesday was a good day, and it was a good day for someone so incredibly small; something that really shouldn't be as out of the ordinary as it actually is: Someone paid me a very nice compliment.

That it. That's all it took to make my day yesterday. I hadn't done anything extraordinary myself; I had just  processed the woman's order as I would any other, and it wasn't even one of those vital, life-saving type things. It was just the foul liquid one has to drink before a colonoscopy (and could someone please confirm that this is a word? Blogspot's spell check apparently doesn't think so). We had a few prescriptions that were waiting ahead of her, but they weren't difficult, and slapping a label on a giant jug that I don't have to do anything with certainly isn't the most trying of tasks.

She was surprised it was ready right when she was done her shopping. Honestly, I wish more people would say that they thought it would take longer, because I usually have people standing at my counter staring at me like morons while I suddenly find the colors of their medications fascinating and thus slow down to admire them a little.

Once I had rung her in, she was happy to note her insurance paid a little on the prescription despite a high deductible, and I asked if she had any questions. Waffling back and forth a little on how it works, I called over the pharmacist, wished her a good day, and went back behind my smoked glass divider to continue with my work.

As she was leaving, she thanked the pharmacist and said something that just made me smile, "And your assistant was wonderful!"

She said something else about telling people about us, but I was a bit too busy smiling at that point. I would almost say it's a sad state of affairs when something so simple as a compliment is so out of place that it surprises me, but that's how it works today. I'm there to work, and if I don't do it within the insane confines of "customer standard time," then they have every right to be angry and berate me or anyone else standing behind the counter.

But either way, it was nice and made the rest of my day much, much better.

Doctors

A little message for my doctor friends, because in your realm of anatomy and other such nonsense, you seem to have forgotten the very simple things we need from you. They're very simple things, really. So simple, that I am forced to facepalm every time we have to call you because you've forgotten one of these rather vital things.

When you leave messages on our telephony system, we need:

• The name of the patient, preferably with spelling. This is especially nice when the name is unusual in any way.
• The date of birth for the patient.
• The medication. You wouldn't think this would be something that could easily be forgotten, but it's happened.
• The strength of the medication. If you merely say "levothyroxine," I will cry. In our store alone, we have at least ten different strengths. With Vicodin, we will always assume you mean the 5/500 strength, because that is the most common.
• THE DIRECTIONS. If we don't get the directions, how are we supposed to know that ninety tablets are only lasting thirty days?
• The number of tablets/capsules/pills we're giving the patient. You can also just tell us the directions and the days' supply you/the patient wants. We're smart, we can do math. I promise, but we do need at least the number of days you want filled.

Simple, yes? You would think so. It gets even more fun when we enter the world of narcotics. There's a longer list of requirements that sometimes just don't get completed all the way, leading to annoyance for us, irritation for you when we keep calling you, and frustration for the customer who is trying to either fill their bouncing child's Ritalin, or the morphine they need to function on a basic human level.

• Name of patient. This is a common theme.
• The date of the prescription. This is ESSENTIAL. It is also important to have a complete date. 6/28/1 will not cut it. You're missing a one. That missing number could imply it was written a month ago, or a year and a month ago.
• Medication and strength.
• Instructions.
• Diagnosis code. MANY insurance companies will not accept ADD and ADHD medication without one.
• Your DEA number. We have to have that for a Schedule II narcotic. It's required at least by the law of our state.
• A hand-written signature.

I really wish it was as simple as the customer handing us the script, me checking to make sure we have it in stock, then filling it. It isn't.
Another issue I have: When we call you, please don't take three days to call us back. I realize you are busy, however... Having one of your medical assistants calling us is not a particularly difficult thing to ask for, is it? Your patient is the one most inconvenienced by this, not us, so please just call us back.

Last, but not least... When I tell your patient that there is a manufacturer back order on the medication you've prescribed them, and that it won't be in stock again until the end of the month, don't turn around and inform them that it sounds absurd. It then sends the customer back to me with the impression that I'm lying to them just to be an ass. When I say there's a back order and that I cannot get it in for almost a month, it means that there is no possible way for us to order that product, and get it in before the date the website gives me.

I was tempted to give that doctor a call and tell him that he could fill it if he was so convinced I was spouting bullshit.

The Telephone

Now, I dislike the phone normally. I don't use it very often, so it would be easy to see how I much I hate the phone when I'm at work. The pharmacist doesn't usually answer the phone unless I'm otherwise busy, and thus, cannot do it.

Here are the normal scenarios for phone calls to my pharmacy:

Scenario One: I pick up the phone, and rattle off my standard greeting, "Yes this is so-and-so from the such-and-such clinic calling in a prescription."

"Alright, I'll get you the pharmacist," and then I put them on hold and pass the buck.

Scenario Two: I give my greeting, "Yes this is so-and-so, and I need to refill prescription number blahblah."

"I'm sorry, but could you wait just a moment? I'm not at the computer just yet. Alright, what was the name again?"

"So-and-so. The number is-"

"I need to wait for my computer to catch up with me. Just one moment, please... Alright, the number?"

"Blahblahblah. When will that be done?"

"Within the next twenty to thirty minutes," I then see if they need anything else before hanging up the phone and sighing. It's a minor annoyance, but one hundred minor annoyances throughout the day really do tend to add up.

Scenario Three: This time, I usually end up being able to spit out that we're a pharmacy before they start in with, "Yeah, my name is blah, and I have this rash? It's all over my junk, and I think I got it when I used some weird lotion? What would you suggest for that?"

"......... That would be something the pharmacist would need to answer. Gimme a moment, and I'll grab him for you," then I get the pharmacist while trying really hard not to laugh.

Scenario Four: "Hi, someone from this number called me, and I was wondering why?"

"Um... I'm not sure, ma'am... Your name?"

"Mary Sue (blah was getting dull)."

I try to look up this customer, and we don't even have records for them, "I'm sorry, Mary, but I can't find you in our system... Give me a moment, and I'll ask the pharmacist if there's something he needed to speak with you about." Pharmacist confirms that he has no frigging clue who the woman is, or why we might have called her, "I'm sorry, again, but the pharmacist says he hasn't called, and I haven't called... We're the only two here, so I'm not sure why this number would be coming up..."

"But someone from there caaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaalled meeeeee!" That high pitched whine? Yeah, thanks for blowing my eardrum.

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but without knowing who called, or why, I really have no way of telling you."

Believe it or not, this conversation will play the merry-go-round game for about five minutes before I can convince them that I really can't tell them why the hell our number shows up on their caller ID.

Scenario Four: Guy calling and either jokingly or seriously asking me if he needs a prescription for Viagra. I tell him yes, but if he doesn't want to get a prescription, there are several over the counter medications available on the sales floor. The ones who are joking are always shamed into hanging up at my nonchalant answer, and the serious ones sputter about how embarrassing it would be to ring something like that through the register. I tell him that he could always ring it up at the pharmacy, and the pharmacist should be able to show him which one is most like Viagra, since there are a few different brands available.

The pharmacist then says he hates me for dooming him to help a guy out with finding OTC erectile dysfunction medication. I just smile and remind him that this is exactly why he went to school for so long to become a pharmacist, and I didn't.

As for outgoing calls... Nine times out of ten, it's me having to call insurance companies, and we all know how much I love insurance companies. The other times, I'm attempting to reach customers who have had scripts sitting there for seven days or more, or there was an issue with filling their prescription and we want to tell them about it before they waste a trip in here. Those times, I usually get an answering machine, and when I get an actual person, the call is still done in under two minutes.

And everyone who has worked with me behind the counter looks at me funny when I tell the phone to shut up.

Insurance Redux

 I know it has not been long since my little diatribe about my disdain for insurance companies, but I now have a fun story from today.

A customer gives me their insurance card to put in the system. Alright... All is fine and good.

Until I see the card doesn't have a BIN number on it. Now... The BIN is how we search for insurance companies with my company's system. Without it, I can't find the insurance. Oh well, I'll just call the number on the card, get the information I need, and all will be good.

....... An automated system. Fan-fucking-tastic. Remind me to tell you all how much I love automated systems. It took me around in circles, never giving me the option to ask for an actual person for close to ten minutes. Seriously? I should be done with the call in less than ten minutes, not still frantically trying to figure out how the hell to get a hold of an actual living being to give me a tiny piece of information.

Finally, the monotone woman of the automated system gives me the option to ask for a representative. Great! Good! I'll take it! ..... More automated crap asking for things that REALLY don't pertain to what I need to be asking. Whatever, I'll pick something random, and then get transferred if I have to.

I finally hear the sweet tones of the voice belonging to an actual person. Her name is Marty, apparently. Well, Marty got to tell me her name and then start to say something before the phone disconnects.

I pause for a few moments, just staring at the phone in disbelief. Are you kidding me? I have to do all of that again? Please, if there is any deity out there, be kind enough to just kill me now; it would be preferable to redialing that number and wading through that God-forsaken system, but I have to.

Skip ahead to my achieving the ultimate goal of reaching an actual person. In my head, all choruses are singing praises to the heavens. I relay my mission only to be told that this wasn't the number I needed. Because they just do the customer's medical coverage, not the prescription coverage. They can, however, transfer me to the company that does the prescription coverage. I manage a terse, "Yes, please..." through clenched teeth as I hear hold music punctuated by an automated voice so soft, that I could never even hope to understand what it's saying.

Another person picks up. Relay my issue again, hoping for the best, "I'm sorry, but this is the member help desk. You need the pharmacy help desk. Would you like me to transfer you?"

I start considering just crying instead, but I agree and go back to listening to the soft hold music with the even softer automated message (now identifiable as informing me of my ability of going to their website). I wait, and wait, and wait, and wait... Then a person! Glorious day! I inform them that I just need their BIN number to set up a customer's insurance; could they please tell me what it is?

Well, of course they can't do that without getting the ID number, card holder's name, the name of the dependent that I'm calling about, and the birth date of said dependent since I didn't possess the birth date of the card holder. Oh, and just for shits and grins, they asked for the customer's zip code. After rattling off all of this information, I at last received what I needed.

A BIN number. That's all I needed; a BIN number. It took me two tries to even get a person in the first place, and close to half an hour on the phone.

Just to get a series of six numbers.

Fuck insurance companies.

Test Strips Hag

Now that I've gotten Miss Switch out of the way, let's move on to Test Strips Hag. This woman is extraordinarily unpleasant to deal with. Pharmacy Manager and I deal with her as little as possible, and I always hope that Second Pharmacist will be there when she comes in because she likes him for reasons unbeknownst to us.

She gets diabetes test strips through HCFA, which takes care of Medicare B payments for medical devices and the like. No problem. We bill them just as we would any other insurance, and the customer pays twenty percent of the cost. Sounds simple enough, yes?

Obviously not. Every month, without fail, she looks at the $3 copay and says while glaring daggers at me, "Why is it always $3?! I'm not supposed to be paying ANYTHING!"

I always tell her that the copay her insurance gives us is the copay, and there's really nothing I can do about it. Well the other day, she brought in this letter from the state outlining the benefits of her additional, state-funded coverage. It said that it would cover most of her copays and that it would cover any deductibles and doughnut holes the patient might push themselves into.

Now that's a pretty damn good deal, but she seemed to think that it was saying she wasn't going to have to pay any copay at all ever. Well... No... The test strips she gets would be over $150 at the cash price, her HCFA price would be $15 something, so the state's compromise is $3. After Second Pharmacist explained this to her, she still seemed rather pissed off, but accepted that she's going to have to pay the $3.

If she weren't so unpleasant every single time she came in, I would probably be a lot more understanding. Diabetes can be scary, and having to pay when you somehow came to understand that you weren't supposed to is a little frustrating. Until I found out why she was paying the $3, I thought it may have been something we had been doing wrong and felt bad for her because it seemed like every time she came in, something went wrong.

Until she decided to be a spiteful she-demon, and take a little survey. Where she then promptly went through the list and answer "no" to any questions inquiring about her experiences with our store. INCLUDING that we somehow managed to fail to inform her of her HIPAA rights and responsibilities as well as our company's privacy policies, something that would be a major violation if it were actually true.

I think the next time she's at my counter, I'm going to take a little time to make sure she's aware of her rights. Because what sort of pharmacy employee would I be if I allowed someone to walk away without at least one of the printed copies we keep at the register?

Miss Switch

I was going to type up a bio on Test Strips Hag, but Miss Switch can go first (since that seems to be what she wants).

Okay, so picture this scene: I, the wonderful Techy, had actually been having an alright day. There was an audit earlier, but we did well and it was mostly stuff the pharmacist had to do, so I did not rightfully care about it. Then this customer showed up.

First thing she does is look at me with as snooty a look as any human being could ever even hope to muster and says, "So I've decided to join your... Program. The one for generics. And I'm thinking about switching all my stuff over here. Tell me what these here would cost," and hands over three scripts.

I look them over, point at each in turn and say, "Well this one will definitely be $9.99. I'm not entirely sure about this one here, but it'll be between $4 and $9.99 because it's somewhere in between our standard filling numb-"

"I don't want you to guess! I want to know! If I'm going to be doing this here program (yes, she really liked to put emphasis on that one word), then I want to know exactly what I'll be paying! If you don't know, then get your manager because he should know!"

Well, that's when I'll admit my tone got a bit icy. I agreed, and went behind our little divider to see if I could look up the oddball prescription. Thankfully, our company's website has a pricing tool for the discount program. Turns out it'll be $6.99. Fine, whatever. I go and inform her in my "I'm trying so hard to be nice to you that my sweet voice will give you instant diabetes" tone, then she demanded, not asked, I tell her what it would cost if it went up to a three month supply instead. Again, whatever will get you out of my fucking sight sooner. $19.89, are you happy now? Will you leave?

"And then I know this isn't a generic, but I have this card. I want you to tell me if it'll be cheaper to use that, or the ten percent discount seniors get."

"Well, ma'am... I have no way of knowing what it will cost until I try processing it..."

"Then process it now! Here's the card!" She handed me the card and started to head off. "While you're doing that, I'm going to test my blood pressure."

Yeah, and I'm sure it'll be through the fucking roof, you obnoxious biddy, I thought to myself as I scanned in the prescriptions. We went through the data entry process, the pharmacist checked it, and got the price to give to her. I didn't hear what she said, but I guess she didn't like it, because she demanded the script back. She was going to have us fill the other two, however.

I love how this entire time, this woman never asked us to do anything. Everything out of her mouth was a command in the most condescending tone manageable, and she acted as though her gracing us with her presence should be applauded and worshiped until the end of days.

I guess she's replaced Test Strips as my new "favorite" customer.

Sir Stares-a-Lot

That is the loving nickname I will provide to one of my customers. It's definitely a lot kinder than some of the other things I've called him including, "That pain in the ass that can leave a ranitidine prescription here for a week and a half, but has to stand there and stare at us while he's waiting for his Vicodin."

As you may have guessed, he seems to be a bit attached to his Vicodin. He has a legitimate prescription from his doctor, but more and more frequently he has begun to really sketch me out. It's gotten to the point where I'm not entirely certain he isn't playing games around his doctor to get the prescription in the first place.

We have frequently had to tell this... Gentleman... Or a woman who I think is his wife (I can't even attempt to call her a lady without giggling insanely to myself) that the Vicodin prescription is too early, but we can fill *insert slew of scripts I had to put back into stock here.* They don't like that, and they spend a little while whining about it, then they go home after the pharmacist explains that if they use the medication properly, they have enough for a thirty day supply. I love the silent accusation there, but I have yet to see either of my pharmacists calling his doctor with our, or at least my, concern about abuse.

I like this little character-setting. I think I may do more of it with the frequent fliers in my pharmacy as they tend to be fun for story-telling.

Just a Minor Rant About Various Insurances

I will make this no secret, and I think it's an opinion that many people in this great nation of ours share: I hate insurance companies. Really, I do. More than the companies themselves, I hate having to attempt to explain them to customers; mostly because I really don't know much more about their particular plan than they do. I know whether or not your insurance company will pay for something (but only after attempting to bill them, keep that in mind), I can tell you how much they were willing to pay (again, only after I've actually billed them), and I can tell you if they denied it, and will accept a prior authorization from your doctor.

That's about it. Other than that, I must point out, it is completely and totally useless to ask me about your plan because I have no idea why you seem to be paying seventy-five dollars one month, then twenty-five the next, then back to seventy-five after that. It's just as much a mystery to me as it is to you, but I digress.

Back to the subject at hand... I hate insurance companies. People pay good money to be "covered" by insurance companies only to discover that they're going to end up paying through the nose anyway. They have ridiculous rules of coverage, and I sometimes find their list of "covered drugs" to be supremely lacking.

Here is a list of medications that I have had to send out PA's for:

• Levothyroxine
• Simvastatin
• Clonazepam
• Liothyronine

That's just to name a few. Note that these are all generics, and except for clonazepam (a C-V), I do believe are covered under my companies generics program. What insurance company askes for a frigging PA for simvastatin? Most insurance companies prefer it because it's one of the cheaper ones! I wish I could remember so I could post their name here and play the shame game, but my mind is drawing a blank.

Another lovely little quirk I've come across was a company that only filled five hundred and fifty fills in a six month period. Meaning that if you're on several essential medications and the combined number of fills for all of them exceeds five hundred and fifty in six months, your insurance company stops paying. Imagine you're on nitrostat for chest pains because you've had, or are at risk of having, a heart attack. Your other medications for blood pressure, blood clotting, and that pain medication came first and took up all your fills, so now your insurance won't pay for potentially life-saving medication because you happen to be on too many medications for their liking. I wish I could blame that one on Medco or CVS Caremark, but alas, I cannot.

Speaking of Medco and Caremark... Allow me to shed some light on why I hate them. I know I'm not alone in this, because everyone who is covered by them that I deal with regularly hates them. I hate how they work, and how they tirelessly seem to enjoy making my life, and by extension the lives of their customers, more difficult than it ever should have to be.

My company doesn't have a ninety day "contract" with Medco. Which means that if we try to fill one of their customers' medications for a three month supply, they go, "Nope! Don't wanna, and you can't make me!" It really is trying on my nerves to have to send the script back to data entry because they don't feel like cooperating with us to get a ninety day contract. They also really like that mail order. So much so that they'll stop paying after a certain point on certain medications because they want the customer to use mail order instead. It's basically a bullying tactic of, "Oh, so you want your medications now? Too fucking bad. Here are some flaming hoops to jump through if you reeeeeeeeeeally want them. Oh, and hold still while I douse you in gasoline first..."

As for Caremark... I just don't care for them. I really don't. They have a lot of the same issues as Medco above, and attempting to call anyone at their "help desk" is infuriating at best, down right rage-inducing at worst. Not to mention that I think I keep missing the pleasant techs because every single one that I've spoken with to date has been incredibly rude and condescending.

And the pharmacists wonder why I put off having to call these Hell spawn. I almost wish for a universal healthcare system so that 1.) Canada and Europe will stop laughing at us and 2.) I never have to speak to those wastes of air and flesh again.

That would please me.

An Introduction of Sorts

Okay, for those of you unfamiliar with pharmacy, and thus tend to launch yourselves into long diatribes about your various ailments that I can really do nothing about...


Here is a list of things I can and cannot do for you:

I CAN:

• Take your prescription and scan it into our computer system. If we don't have you on file, I can also add you.
• Tell you about how long it's going to take to fill your Viagra prescription. I'll even be polite, and leave out my side commentary of, "About as long as your dick, sir: not very."
• Do the data entry on your prescription.
• Call your fucking insurance company because they don't feel like paying for your prescription for whatever reason. No, they really don't give me much of a reason past a jumble of random letters and numbers usually. Yes, that's annoying. No, I can't do much about it.
• Get essentially called an idiot by your insurance company's help desk while we're attempting to figure out why I'm getting an "invalid birth date" error when I've confirmed with both you and them that we have the correct one on file.
• Count your pills once that is settled.
• Ignore you staring at me stupidly throughout this entire process.
• Tapping my foot impatiently while I wait for the pharmacist to get his ass in gear and do the final checks on your prescription.
• Ringing you out, asking you if you have any questions for the pharmacist, and wishing you a good day no matter how dearly I wish for the opposite.
• Answer questions about where things are on the sales floor.

I CANNOT:

• Magically make your doctor call us back
• Explain to you why your insurance suddenly wants you to pay a $30 copay instead of $10.
• Make the pharmacist move any faster than he really feels like moving.
• Answer questions about any "adverse reactions" you may be having to your Viagra medications.
• Tell you that Tylenol and our store brand acetaminophen are exactly the same thing (even if it says so right on the bottle).
• Tell you what the hell your three-page list of medications are actually for.
• Do the ENTIRE filling process myself because the pharmacist stepped out for five minutes. Sorry, he needs to check things. That's his job.
• Make a $300 brand name prescription only cost you $5.
• Tell you the generic name and all of the therapeutic equivalents to the brand written on your prescription.

I didn't go to school for six years, so I don't get to do all those things. Thankfully, it also means that if you become a pissy pain in my ass, I can hand you off to the pharmacist who is more than capable of telling you to shove it.